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Before applicant tracking systems entered the scene, recruiters would stack up piles of resumes on their desks, organize files in cabinets and depend heavily on spreadsheets.
But HR tech has significantly evolved since the 90s – and so has the recruitment process. On top of that, the job market became more candidate-centric which made dimensions such as employer brand and candidate experience vital parts of HR. Today, applicant tracking systems have symbolized a turning point in the management of the hiring process.
So, how do applicant tracking systems actually work? And why did they turn into the tool that recruiting teams can no longer live without? We answer all your burning questions in this blog post!
What is an Applicant Tracking System?
An applicant tracking system is commonly referred to as software that helps HR professionals manage the entire recruitment process from acquisition to hire. A great ATS gives hiring teams the tools, features, and functionality they need to source, evaluate, and hire top talent quickly.
Applicant tracking systems can be used by both small and large companies to help them standardize and digitize the hiring process to benefit recruiters and candidates alike.
Also, an applicant tracking system improves the recruiter’s productivity by enabling them to post jobs on multiple job boards in a single click and streamline communication with candidates through personalized email templates.
How Does It Exactly Work?
An applicant tracking system integrates multiple steps in the recruitment process and optimizes functions such as tracking, evaluating, filtering, ranking, and communicating. It boosts recruiting efficiency by implementing agile procedures that customize the candidate journey and hiring workflows. The steps are pretty simple:
- The job is created
- The job is posted on a career page or job board(s)
- Candidates apply for the vacancy
- Resumes are screened and ranked
- Candidates are interviewed
- The best candidate is hired
To start off, an ATS can help you build and customize branded career pages without the need to write a single line of code. Where you can effortlessly attract, inspire, and convert candidates with ease. It also enables you to post jobs across a global portfolio of job boards, niche channels, and social media platforms. Not only does it improve your employer brand, but it also reduces time-to-hire significantly.
Plus, applicant tracking systems allow you to customize and automate pipelines according to your needs. With automated call-to-actions, you can easily speed up time-to-hire through the automation of repetitive tasks and emails. Recruiting teams can also schedule automated emails for a future date or time, set up triggers for each hiring stage, and allow candidates to self-schedule interviews to increase productivity and ultimately reduce time-to-hire.
What Are the Advantages of Using One?
One of the greatest things about applicant tracking systems is that they imitate the human mind and scan resumes for keywords. Except they do it a thousand times faster!
Keyword Scanning for Efficiency
For example, when you add resumes into an ATS, it will consequently scan them for specific keywords that you’re hiring for. So, if you’re hiring a Marketing Director, the ATS will search for resumes with the keyword “Marketing Director” or other similar keywords. Then, at a glance, you can quickly find the candidates you’re looking for. This means that you can save time and money and progressively reduce the margin of errors!
Building a Talent Pool
On another note, an applicant tracking system can help you build a talent pool as your safety net, just in case you get an impromptu departure from one of your best employees. To save time on sourcing, you can simply compile a list of qualified candidates that sparked your interest over time and store their details in your ATS. Then, you can categorize them based on their skills, experience, and education to create a talent pool that you can dip into when the time is right.
Transforming Offline Databases
An ATS can also help you automatically import and turn your offline database into an online, accessible, and searchable one. All you have to do is simply drag and drop your resumes, and our ATS will automatically create a profile for each candidate.
Then, you can search for resumes by using specific keywords and intelligently match these resumes with pre-existing job posts or job descriptions that you have. As a result, with an advanced applicant tracking system, you can easily handpick top talent from the pile and save 90% of your time!
Enhancing the Candidate Experience
In addition, an ATS can help you provide a simple, fast, and efficient mobile-friendly experience where candidates can apply for jobs directly from their phones with only a few clicks. This way, when your application process is fast, intuitive, and smooth, you can effortlessly prevent and minimize dropouts.
Skills Improvement Recommendations
Last but not least, applicant tracking systems can recommend online courses by Coursera and Udemy to candidates. These recommendations are based on any missing or required skills that the candidates must learn or improve in order to meet the job requirements!
How Can Recruiters Benefit from It?
Since an applicant tracking system can automate many administrative tasks, this frees up the recruiter’s time to focus more on strategic endeavors and high-level tasks such as hiring and recruiting top-notch candidates.
In addition, this enables recruiters to hire faster and more efficiently as they do not spend as much time on time-consuming tasks such as searching, screening, and filtering candidates. Generally, an ATS helps recruiters focus on what’s most important: hiring great talent and building a skillful workforce.
In What Way Can It Improve the Parsing Process?
An applicant tracking system can be a blessing for turning that pile of 300 resumes into a shortlist of 20. With powerful resume screening tools at hand, recruiters can quickly set the minimum threshold for skills, education, or experience required for the job and weed out the candidates who don’t really meet them.
Many applicant tracking systems are intuitive. They can take into account that all resumes have unique formats. They have built-in parsing features that watch out for critical pieces of information about a candidate and lay it all out for recruiters in an unvarying way that is easy to understand and digest.
Let’s take this example. Under certain circumstances, candidates might have some errors in their applications, such as typos. These typos might not be recognized as genuine mistakes by unintuitive filtration systems. An advanced ATS is designed to recognize language in all its functions and forms. It can understand abbreviations, titles, synonyms, antonyms, homographs, and spelling mistakes.
For instance, when a candidate uses the word “CAT” in their application, the ATS is smart enough to detect that this word stands for the Common Admission Test and not an actual cat. This way, candidates won’t get unfairly disqualified or eliminated from the pipeline.
ATSs Are Here Forever
As employers continue trying to net top talent, candidate experience is becoming more of a priority. This means automation and applicant tracking systems aren’t going away; they’re just becoming more and more necessary.
Whether you’re looking for a one-star candidate or have dozens of vacancies to fill, our applicant tracking system can meet all your hiring needs – and budget! It will innovatively help you attract and recruit candidates who will make a lasting contribution to your company.
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